I'll risk the sake of telling you **** you already probably know as I am late to the party.

Steel cased ammo plauges AR15 because of a couple of different things happening. The steel casing doesn't expand as far and constrict as fast as brass cases do. That causes unburned powder to get past the case leaving deposits in ths chamber that brass casings will get stuck if shot without cleaning the chamber after steel cased ammo is used. The carbine gas system, which by design may try to extract the casing before it has had time to constrict and possibly the force of the extractor hitting the rim of the case as the round enters the chamber is another cause of extractor failure. Add the weaker powder charge and tight chamber there are several causes for malfunction in the AR.

I have only shot 100 rounds of Brown Bear steel cased ammo through my BCM Midlength. Aside from terrible accuracy, it cycled just fine. I really only shoot M193 and M855 through my rifles (including my STG556, BCM AR15 and SIG556) I don't see a need to shoot steel cased 5.56 when brass is easy to find. Now my x39 AR is a project gun made for abuse. It gets only Wolf and what ever cheap 7.62x39 I can find. If the piaton assembly was easy to take apart for cleaning I would only shoot Yugo Surplus. But that is reserved for the AK build.

[quote=LA_357SIG;630815]I'll risk the sake of telling you **** you already probably know as I am late to the party.

Steel cased ammo plauges AR15 because of a couple of different things happening. The steel casing doesn't expand as far and constrict as fast as brass cases do. That causes unburned powder to get past the case leaving deposits in ths chamber that brass casings will get stuck if shot without cleaning the chamber after steel cased ammo is used. The carbine gas system, which by design may try to extract the casing before it has had time to constrict and possibly the force of the extractor hitting the rim of the case as the round enters the chamber is another cause of extractor failure. Add the weaker powder charge and tight chamber there are several causes for malfunction in the AR.

I have only shot 100 rounds of Brown Bear steel cased ammo through my BCM Midlength. Aside from terrible accuracy, it cycled just fine. I really only shoot M193 and M855 through my rifles (including my STG556, BCM AR15 and SIG556) I don't see a need to shoot steel cased 5.56 when brass is easy to find. Now my x39 AR is a project gun made for abuse. It gets only Wolf and what ever cheap 7.62x39 I can find. If the piaton assembly was easy to take apart for cleaning I would only shoot Yugo Surplus. But that is reserved for the AK build.

I'll risk the sake of telling you **** you already probably know as I am late to the party.

Steel cased ammo plauges AR15 because of a couple of different things happening. The steel casing doesn't expand as far and constrict as fast as brass cases do. That causes unburned powder to get past the case leaving deposits in ths chamber that brass casings will get stuck if shot without cleaning the chamber after steel cased ammo is used. The carbine gas system, which by design may try to extract the casing before it has had time to constrict and possibly the force of the extractor hitting the rim of the case as the round enters the chamber is another cause of extractor failure. Add the weaker powder charge and tight chamber there are several causes for malfunction in the AR.

I have only shot 100 rounds of Brown Bear steel cased ammo through my BCM Midlength. Aside from terrible accuracy, it cycled just fine. I really only shoot M193 and M855 through my rifles (including my STG556, BCM AR15 and SIG556) I don't see a need to shoot steel cased 5.56 when brass is easy to find. Now my x39 AR is a project gun made for abuse. It gets only Wolf and what ever cheap 7.62x39 I can find. If the piaton assembly was easy to take apart for cleaning I would only shoot Yugo Surplus. But that is reserved for the AK build.

you fired 100 rounds of brown bear? and now your an expert?

the US army tested what 23,000 rounds?

i think i'll go with the armys findings.

Wow. You are right. My 100 rounds of BB through 1 AR15 doesn't qualify me as an expert. And I didn't read the article or watch the video. But I will say the dozen or so cases of Wolf I have shot through multiple AR's of different barrel lengths and brands over the years do not exactly make me any less qualified to post any observations I have noted after all those rounds and all those years. And I thought the mall ninja forums were less arrogant.

ETA: I don't shoot steel cased 5.56 anymore because for plinking I shoot a dedicated AR-22. No reason to wear out my main rifle with cheap ammo when 22lr is cheaper and the same setup.

Wow. You are right. My 100 rounds of BB through 1 AR15 doesn't qualify me as an expert. And I didn't read the article or watch the video. But I will say the dozen or so cases of Wolf I have shot through multiple AR's of different barrel lengths and brands over the years do not exactly make me any less qualified to post any observations I have noted after all those rounds and all those years. And I thought the mall ninja forums were less arrogant.

ETA: I don't shoot steel cased 5.56 anymore because for plinking I shoot a dedicated AR-22. No reason to wear out my main rifle with cheap ammo when 22lr is cheaper and the same setup.

get over yourself-- we have fired thousands of rounds of the shit. i have fired thousands of it through the ar-15s in 5.56 and 7.62x39.

it is not as accurate. mainly because the russians don't go to much trouble to form the bullet. it is a little dirty.

otherwise it don't harm anything.

so you fired a 100 rounds of brown bear? now you have fired 1,000s of rounds of wolf?

which is it?

this place has a tough crowd of life long shooters, most of which have been shooting ak's fal, and ar-15/m16s for decades.

LA Welcome too the forum..

What was the ammo we would have been shooting back in the late 60s.
Brass steel. Hell I dont know?
Someone put up a good post on what we did too the barrels. He was an armorer back in the old days.
He said we destroyed the barrels. Hahhha. Sorry about their luck.
I didnt pay for the ammo and I didnt like their damn war anyway.
Whatever the ammo was.
We put thousands of rounds through without even cleaning them. Darn things kept ticking.

"Man needs but two things to survive alone in the woods. A blow up female doll and his trusty old AK-47" - Thomas Jefferson 1781

i don't know how many rounds a 1-9" 4140 barrel will do before it is shot.

i would wager thousands of dollars of the cheap steel stuff. enough to make the barrel a "disposable" item.

seems like someone tested one on this board and it ran nearly 10K and this is the no chrome 4140s-- similar to the $115 one. i got a couple chrome 4140s that i have lost count of. the seem to have plenty of life left in them.

every once in a while i'll get some russian ammo that don't want to do right --like that half case of tula .223, that is the exception though not the rule.

most of the time the russian made ammo runs fine. every once in a while i get a really good batch like the wolf 75gr stuff. it is printing 1.25" groups from the savage bolt gun. doing just under 2" with my middy.

yea i know the savage can do .40" at 100M but the 1.25 groups is about as good as it will do with ball ammo so this batch is pretty damn good for $4.25 a box!

all this crap about ejector wear and extractor wear? i haven't seem much at all. best i can tell the same as brass.

if the steel cased ammmo had good copper jacketed bullets and good clean powder i think it could do anything the brass ammo could and would wear things about the same.

and that is from my experience with it.

now the army did test a pretty good quantity 20K rounds is a pretty extensive test. i am sure they had better bullets and powder than the russians use. wear and reliability of the steel was the same.

What was the ammo we would have been shooting back in the late 60s.
Brass steel. Hell I dont know?
Someone put up a good post on what we did too the barrels. He was an armorer back in the old days.
He said we destroyed the barrels. Hahhha. Sorry about their luck.
I didnt pay for the ammo and I didnt like their damn war anyway.
Whatever the ammo was.
We put thousands of rounds through without even cleaning them. Darn things kept ticking.

i think that was from running the "fun" side of the selector to much 4th!

i got a web page from sig somewhere where they were talking about their 5.56 rifle/carbine.

seems they said their nitrite finished barrels would last 30K plus rounds but only 15k if run "severe" i think that is full-auto.